The Fifth Stage Part 37

CHAPTER 23.

Reggie looks at me. When he frowns, his eyebrows rush together like two lovesick caterpillars. "We're not going to budge on this quote."

Bob shakes his head. "Give me five percent."

Reggie waves his hand in my direction. "Claire, tell him. Never be afraid to walk away from a deal. When you give up your walk-away power, you've lost. You'll get screwed every time."

I lean back in my chair and watch a black spider try to build a web across the fluorescent light fixture. "Reggie's right. If I'd had the nerve to walk away from the Lexicon deal ten years ago, we'd still have made the sale, and we would've made about twice the profit."

CHAPTER 25.

CHAPTER 27.

CHAPTER 28.

That's enough for now. Tonight, it's dinner and a horror flick, nothing more. We finish our pizza, put away the leftovers, and settle down to watch the rest of the movie. But soon, Rebecca's long week catches up with her, and she starts to yawn. I drop a throw pillow across my lap, and with little protest, she kicks off her sneakers and stretches out. She's asleep before the movie is half over, but that's okay. I turn off the TV and listen to her breathe.

CHAPTER 30.

CHAPTER 31.

When I'd made it home from a late meeting in Nashville Thursday night, Lora had been in bed for hours. I'd been a sleep-deprived s.p.a.ce cadet when she'd left for the office early that morning, so we'd hardly seen each other in five days. When our eyes met, we both broke out in silly grins. If anyone had seen us, they'd have thought we'd been smoking something very good.

I bounded across the concrete and picked up the ball, which had landed beneath a pink rhododendron by the driveway. "Think I've got any college eligibility left? I might call Pat Summit and see if the Lady Vols need any help this year."

"Gee, I don't know. I hear she's got a six-foot-two forward who's slippery as an eel. She might manage this season without you." Lora pursed her lips, mocking my enthusiasm with a roll of her eyes.

"Maybe next year." I tried to spin the basketball on my index finger, but as usual, it careened away and bounced toward the street. "Up for a little one-on-one?" I skittered after the ball.

"Sure. Let me change first."

In a few minutes she returned wearing sneakers, baggy shorts, and one of my old Lady Warriors T-shirts. She'd pulled her hair back into a ponytail and looked as energetic as when she'd donned her cheerleading uniform so many years before to coax the Warrior football team to victory.

CHAPTER 32.

CHAPTER 33.

It never occurred to me not to trust Lora. Sure, I wasn't self-confident, never did feel good enough for her, and definitely never understood what she saw in me. But I was confident in my lover. True-blue as they come, my Lora was. A lot of women hit on her. Pretty women, women with plenty of cash, women with style to spare. She brushed each one of them off with a firm smile. For some crazy reason, I was her choice.

It didn't happen all at oncethe paranoia, the suspicion. It crept up on me, like a cold, where first you get a tickle in your throat, then your nose stops up, and before you know it, you're miserable. But with a cold, you know you'll get over it. My mistrust was incurable. It stayed with me constantly, draining my energy and making me short-tempered. By the end, I'd turned into a pure b.i.t.c.h.

I didn't handle it well, right from the beginning. Things might have turned out okay if I'd talked to her. Maybe we could've avoided the catastrophe if I'd confronted her and given her a chance to come clean. But I hid my fears and let them fester into resentment and eventually tear me apart. CHAPTER 34

end.